


do you believe them?

by you_get_to_exhale_now_cyrus



Category: Andi Mack (TV)
Genre: Fall Formal, M/M, Self Confidence Issues, aka cyrus is me, and also a small confession, and tj is my friends being all nice, self deprecating jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-03
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-21 21:13:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17649965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/you_get_to_exhale_now_cyrus/pseuds/you_get_to_exhale_now_cyrus
Summary: Cyrus has been saying some things about himself that TJ cannot get over.





	do you believe them?

“And so I told him that I didn’t want to date him anymore,” Buffy said, poking at her lunch with her fork, “so I guess…that’s the end of that,”

“How’d he take it?” Jonah asked, spreading some butter on his roll.

“Alright, I guess,” she shrugged, “I mean, he wasn’t over the moon with excitement, but he didn’t look devastated,”

“What are we talking about?” TJ asked, taking a seat by Cyrus. He’d started to have lunch with them, almost daily, and although he would never admit it out loud, Cyrus would physically frown if he didn’t.

“Buffy’s break up with Walker,” Andi supplied, taking a bite of her sandwich, “you’re just in time for the drama,”

Buffy rolled her eyes, pushing her tray aside. “There’s no drama. Plus, with all of this,” she gestured to herself, “I’ll have all the guys trailing after me,”

“Can’t relate,” Cyrus piped up, and the girls erupted into laughter. TJ furrowed his eyes; he didn’t find that particularly funny, but he remained quiet.

“So,” Andi started, “are you guys going to the Fall Formal?” she asked.

“Don’t you mean ‘do any of you guys know if Amber is going to the dance’?,” Buffy countered with a smirk, giggling as she saw Andi’s face burn bright red.

“That’s not true,” she lied, her voice cracking, so she opted for sipping her juice, “I just…wanted to see if _you_ guys were going,”

“Mhm,” Buffy hummed, snapping an apple slice in half, “whatever you say. Completely off topic, I heard that Amber was going to the dance,” she said, turning towards Cyrus and TJ.

“Ah yes, thank you for that valuable information. I am sure it will be of great use to me,” TJ joked, breaking out into a smile.

“Not funny,” Andi whined, crossing her arms.

“I’m going to see if Walker still wants to go,” Jonah cut in, “I feel bad for him, no offense Buffy,”

“None taken,”

“What about you Cyrus? Are you going to go?” Jonah asked, the smile never leaving his face.

Cyrus scoffed at that, nearly laughing. “Are you kidding me? Me, go to a dance alone? Please,”

“You don’t know that you’d be going alone,” TJ suggested, to which Cyrus actually laughed out loud.

“That’s hilarious. Nobody would ever ask this basket of noodles to dance,” he informed him, and the table broke into laughter yet again. All except for TJ, that was. He was frowning, and felt almost…angry. Why were they laughing? It wasn’t funny.

“Hey, can you meet me at the swings after school?” TJ whispered to him.

Cyrus nodded, a small smile on his face. “Yeah, I’ll see you there,”

The bell rang, signaling the end of lunch, and the kids groaned, putting their trays away and throwing away their trash. None of them wanted to go to class, but TJ thought that he wanted to go to class least of all.

* * *

TJ swore that history class was actually twice as long, and that the concept of time didn’t exist anymore, but the moment the bell rang, he was bolting out the door. He nearly tripped and bumped into a few people on the way out, but he couldn’t be bothered to say anything. With every step, he got closer to the swings, closer to Cyrus.

As he made his way outside, he saw a small figure at the swings. Not moving, just barely swaying. Feeling his heart thump inside of his chest, he dropped his bag by the bench and hopped on his swing.

“Hey,” he said, brightening up, “what’d you wanna talk about?”

TJ hesitated. “How’d…you know I wanted to talk about something?”

Cyrus rolled his eyes, a soft smile gracing his face. “You only come to the swings when you need to talk about something or clear your head, and something tells me the latter isn’t true,” he pointed out.

TJ nodded; Cyrus could really read right through him couldn’t he? “Yeah,” he mumbled, “I just…I don’t know, I might be reading too much into this but today at lunch you seemed…off,”

Cyrus frowned, kicking at the mulch beneath him. “Off? How?”

TJ shrugged, as if he wasn’t sure, but he was positive about why. “You just…some of the things you said about yourself…not going to the dance because who would wanna ask you…not having people ‘trailing after you’, I don’t know,”

Cyrus chuckled. “That’s not odd, that’s pretty typical of me. Give it a few months, you’ll get used to it,”

“I don’t _want_ to get used to it, Cy. And you shouldn’t either,” TJ said firmly, pausing for a moment, “do you believe it?”

“Believe what?”

“All the things you say, about yourself,” TJ murmured, turning a little to face him, “do you really believe all the things you say?”

Cyrus hesitated, his smile long gone. He swallowed, feeling his hands trembled ever so slightly. “I mean,” he said softly, forcing a smile, “nobody’s ever bothered to correct me or say something like ‘hey that’s not true’ so I guess after a while…” he trailed, shaking his head.

“Cyrus,” TJ started, his voice firm, yet comforting, “look at me,”

He really didn’t want to look at TJ, and this was one of the few times he’d get to think that. He didn’t want to look into his green eyes, and lose it. He couldn’t bear that.

“Cyrus,”

Giving in, he glanced up, impatiently waiting for whatever TJ wanted to say. He really hoped it was going to be short.

“I need you to listen to me, please,” he said softly, his voice low, “all those things that you say about yourself, all that…self deprecating nonsense, none of it is true, okay? None of it,”

Cyrus chuckled, albeit sadly. “Alright, whatever you say,” he mused, trying to stand up and leave, but TJ was having none of that.

“I’m serious, Cyrus,” he said, his voice wobbling ever so slightly, “you can’t believe all the things you say. Your friends laugh, yeah, but at what expense? You are one of the greatest people I’ve ever met and every time you say that you’re not good enough or you aren’t something else…it hurts, okay?” he admitted, feeling his eyes start to water, “it hurts me when you say things like that. Because I can see that you’re this amazing, intelligent, beautiful person, and I don’t get why you can’t,”

Cyrus sat, speechless, jaw open just slightly. He could barely process what TJ had said. “…you think I’m beautiful?” was all that he managed, smiling ever so slightly.

TJ went red, rubbing the back of his neck. “Crap, okay, uhm, well, this wasn’t the way that I planned for this to go,” he stammered, clearly flustered, “I-I was wondering if maybe, possibly, o pressure if you can’t, if you wanted to, and you can say no-”

“Just,” Cyrus stopped him, offering a small smile, “say what’s on your mind,”

“I was wondering…if you wanted to go to the Fall Formal with me?”

For the second time that day, Cyrus was speechless. He _really_ hadn’t expected that. “Of course I’ll go with you, TJ!”

“Well, a guy can try, you know, I guess-” he paused, shaking his head, “wait, what?”

“I said I’d love to go with you,” Cyrus clarified, beaming.

“Wow, uh, okay,” he stammered, “sorry, I-I didn’t think I’d get this far,” he chuckled, holding up a finger, “one condition though,”

Cyrus deflated. “You’re not going to make me wear some stupid tie, are you?”

“What? No, that’s insane,” TJ brushed that thought away, “no, I mean, I’ll take you to Fall Formal, _but_ you need to stop saying all those negative things about yourself,”

Cyrus rolled his eyes playfully. “Alright, alright, I’ll try and stop. Happy?”

TJ beamed, taking Cyrus’ hand in his own. “Very,”

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on tumblr @you-get-to-exhale-now-cyrus


End file.
